Discussion of Rural Minnesota
First, UMD students talk about your understandings of the urban-rural spectrum in Minnesota -- (300 words, cite the class readings).
USFQ students, then, respond with your own experience and expertise.
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Even though I live in Minnesota, I wasn't too keen on the urban-rural spectrum of the state. From my understanding, Minnesota is a bunch of smaller-(ish) towns or cities with small population. And the main large cluster of cities is Minneapolis and St. Paul. Turns out that's basically right. While reading the canvas website provided, I found that "more than 80% of Minnesota’s population lived in urban
ReplyDeleteareas." and that "As of 2020, the seven-county metro area is projected
to make up 63% of the state’s population—"( Website I used: https://www.minnesotago.org/application/files/6416/5270/8798/MNDOT_Urban_Rural_Trend_FINAL.pdf)
Looking at the map of Minnesota, the state is mostly one giant blue rural mass. And at the bottom right is a green splotch which indicates where the Twin Cities are (Tagged as an Urban area with 50,000 or more) There are a few other "green splotches", one of them being Duluth, but for the majority the state is rural with 2,493 or less.
This makes sense to me since one of the things Minnesota is known for is its nature! Everyone goes up the north shore to escape into the Boundary Waters and camp. One interesting thing I read, was that despite the spread-out towns and forests, that Minnesota's population is growing!
"Given the strong historical trend of Minnesota’s population becoming more urbanized, it is fair to project that Minnesota’s population growth will
continue to occur predominately in urban areas. This continued steady urbanization in Minnesota is projected to
lead to population decline in two-thirds of its counties by 2053."
According to the website, it looks like the metro area will be the center for population growth and the surrounding areas will diminish in size. Everyone's moving to the Twin Cities!
Madeline, I really appreciated your honesty about not having thought much about the urban–rural spectrum in Minnesota before looking at the data. From a my perspective, it’s interesting how your intuitive understanding (that most of the population clusters around Minneapolis and St. Paul) was largely confirmed by demographic trends.
DeleteWhat stood out to me is the contrast between geographic space and population distribution. You describe the map as a “giant blue rural mass” with a few green urban splotches like Duluth. From here in Ecuador, that pattern feels both familiar and different. We also have highly concentrated metropolitan regions surrounded by vast rural territories, but the scale and density differ significantly. In your case, it seems that even though the land is overwhelmingly rural, most people live in urban areas, especially in the Twin Cities metro.
I also found your point about nature compelling. The fact that people “go up north” to places like the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness reflects how rural spaces function not only as productive or residential areas, but also as cultural and recreational landscapes. In Ecuador, rural areas similarly carry symbolic value, (they represent biodiversity, tradition, and ecological richness) even as economic opportunities draw people toward cities.
The projection that two-thirds of counties may decline in population by 2053 is striking. It suggests that “rural” doesn’t just mean sparsely populated; it may also mean aging populations, economic restructuring, and shifting identities. From my academic experience, this kind of urban concentration can increase innovation and services in metro areas, but it can also widen territorial inequalities.
Density of populations matters. I like your thinking of MN as more rural than urban. It must ring true compared to others states. So are there more distinctions that involve characteristics of areas in general that allow of to say something is rural as opposed to urban?
DeleteSara, that is a great question, especially because there are studies that measure "rural but forty minutes or less from a major metro center" -- in other words, rural if understood on its own metrics, but close enough to the city to have drivable access to the resources.
DeleteI have always understood Minnesota to be a smaller, less populated state, but I don’t think I fully realized how isolated some areas are and the challenges they face when it comes to accessing education, food sources, and medical care. The majority of Minnesota residents live within 10-20 minutes (driving time) from a public high school. However, this assumes access to a car. Many students cannot access a car or public transportation, and they must walk or bike to school. This increases travel time to upwards of two hours in some areas (source). Proximity to supermarkets is another issue many isolated rural Minnesota residents contend with. For much of central and northern Minnesota, it takes over an hour of walking to reach the nearest supermarket/food center. In Cass County, for example, only 11% of the population can reach a food center within 60 minutes (source). This is valuable time that not every family can afford to expend. Population distribution, retail locations, and infrastructure planning all play a critical role in shaping accessibility patterns. This is also the case with access to adequate healthcare/trauma centers. Trauma response, specifically when it comes to car crashes, takes two separate time blocks: time from an ambulance depot to the highway mile marker, and time from the highway mile marker to the nearest trauma center. In many areas of northern Minnesota, it could take over two hours just to make it from the crash site to a trauma center. That means at least four hours of waiting between the crash time to when you could reach the trauma center. In cases of severe trauma, immediate medical attention is imperative – a need that is difficult to fulfill if you are injured two hours away from health services. Thinking about these things has led me to see ruralness/urbanness as a spectrum of access and made me wonder what it would entail to increase education/food/healthcare availability in small-town environments.
ReplyDeleteHockert et al. (2025, January 15). What’s Local in Rural Minnesota? ArcGIS StoryMaps; Esri. https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/30c01bd8c04c41608b813172f83660ba
That is the number one question I think about, all the time, this semester -- how to increase access.
DeleteReading about the urban rural spectrum in Minnesota made me think about similar differences in Ecuador. I have lived my whole life in Quito, which is the capital. In Quito, access for me to services like schools, supermarkets, and hospitals is usually easy. I have almost always lived close to my school, and there are many transportation options such as buses, taxis, or cars. Because of this, daily activities like going to class or buying food usually do not take much time.
DeleteHowever, my perspective changes when I think about the place where my grandparents live, in the province of El Oro. During holidays I used to visit them, and their house is about fifteen minutes from Pasaje, which is a small city where many people go to work or buy different things. In that area, people depend more on nearby cities like Pasaje to access services and stores.
Access to healthcare is also different. There is a health center near my relatives’ house, located on a main road, but it is not very well equipped. It mainly offers consultations and basic treatments, and for more serious medical problems people have to travel to Pasaje or Machala.
For transportation, many people use the bus, although some people also have their own vehicles. It is common to see old pickup trucks that are used to transport products from cacao farms.
Thank you for the nuanced discussion of rural MN. Although I lived there for 9 years (on the Twin Cities), I had not thought about this issue at all!
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to rural Minnesota, the first thing I think of is access to resources. Three important aspects of resource access that the article talks about are access to school, grocery stores, and health services.
ReplyDeleteIf someone needing to go to any of these locations doesn't have access to a vehicle (the worst instance being a child that needs to get to school,) rural areas make things much harder because of their terrain. For example, rural areas are much more likely to have unpaved gravel or dirt roads, lack of sidewalks, no bike lanes, high speed traffic, etc. Not only are these circumstances more dangerous for people getting around, they also cause bikers to have a much longer travel time to reach their destination. The article found that in rural areas, bikers have around twice the travel time to get to their high schools than bikers in urban areas.
Access to fresh food is something that is extremely important for everyone's health. Unfortunately, rural areas in Minnesota also experience a notably reduced access to grocery stores in their immediate vicinity. This forces people to either settle for more unhealthy foods, or commute larger times to seek out healthier options.
Most concerning of all, rural areas in Minnesota can have immense travel times to trauma centers. Mostly in the northern region, but also present in other areas that are away from larger cities, travel time to trauma centers can be from 100-120 minutes. In the very northern parts of Minnesota, these travel times can even get to 180 minutes. I couldn’t imagine what it must feel like to know that if you get in a life threatening car accident it will take you three hours to get to the nearest hospital. I wonder how much this travel time affects how people go about their daily lives in these areas, as well as how it affects the rates of fatal car accidents.
Hockert et al. (2025, January 15). What’s Local in Rural Minnesota? ArcGIS StoryMaps; Esri. https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/30c01bd8c04c41608b813172f83660ba
Resources, dor sure. Love the article!!
DeleteThat three hours number horrifies me, because even when everyone is doing their best to do everything they can and should do, you will still die.
DeleteBy reading your comment and also by the few times I've visited any place in the United States I've noticed the importance of having a car. Because apparently if you don't have a car you are in big trouble, the acces to healthcare and buying first necessity products becomes a problem. It seems like in a lot of places when they are not urban the public transportation system is not that useful.
DeleteHonestly, the only thing I can think of right now that has not been said already is how normal all this might be in the lives of these people. After all, I think there are still many people who live without believing that someday they will get sick, so you will not realize that you need a hospital nearby until that moment.
DeleteReading your posts about rural Minnesota honestly made me think a lot about how much geography shapes people’s daily lives. What impacted me the most was learning about the long travel times to schools, grocery stores, and especially trauma centers, because having to wait two or even three hours to reach a hospital in an emergency sounds really intense and scary. It shows that being rural is not just about living near nature or in a small town, but about physical distance from basic services that many of us take for granted. From my experience in Ecuador, I can relate to this connection between location and opportunity. In rural areas, especially in the Sierra or the Amazon region, people also face longer travel times to access healthcare, universities, or even stable jobs. At the same time, I found it interesting that Minnesota is mostly rural in land but mostly urban in population, which creates this contrast between space and where resources are concentrated. In Ecuador we see something similar with cities like Quito and Guayaquil concentrating opportunities while other regions have fewer options. For me, this discussion helped me see ruralness less as an identity and more as a question of access, infrastructure, and inequality. It made me realize that where someone lives can strongly influence their safety, education, and future possibilities, even in places that are considered developed.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you; urban areas often ignore the problems of rural areas, which means that rural areas are affected in areas such as health and education, preventing them from accessing necessary services and thus limiting their quality of life due to social and economic effects.
DeleteMaria -- Rural is both about access and identity, and I can't thank you enough for reminding me of that!
DeleteAbsolutely, geography shapes lives. Nicely stated, location and opportunity
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteWhile reading about rural life in Minnesota, I realized that a similar situation exists. Understanding how this limitation of opportunities arises for populations concentrated in these rural areas is crucial. These limitations are reflected in aspects such as employment, education, and healthcare, to name a few. Often, this is determined by the type of economic activity present in these areas. While this activity may provide the necessary sustenance for people in some cases, it can also limit their options. For example, the lack of access to a good healthcare or education system in these areas forces them to rely on urban areas for quality services. However, due to the nature of the economic activities and lifestyles in these urban areas, the costs are often prohibitively high for many people.
ReplyDeleteThis type of problem is quite common in Ecuador. While there are clearly marked differences in terms of political and economic functioning compared to Minnesota, there is a close similarity in terms of the type of problems, which directly affect the rural populations of both places. In both contexts, geographic isolation and limited infrastructure contribute to unequal access to opportunities and essential services. Rural communities often depend on agriculture or resource-based activities that sustain local economies but can restrict diversification and long-term economic mobility.
Additionally, migration patterns reinforce these disparities, as younger generations frequently move to urban centers seeking education and employment opportunities. This process leaves rural areas with aging populations and fewer resources to maintain local development. Recognizing these shared challenges emphasizes the importance of improving connectivity, infrastructure, and access to services in order to reduce inequalities and support more balanced regional development.
I am dreaming and hoping that someone will tell me what the MOUNTAINS do to these questions in Ecuador. And the ISLANDS. Ecuador is so different!
DeleteI am a student from Quito and even though we are in completely different countries, some of the challenges feel similar because when you move outside the city into more rural Andean or Amazon regions of Ecuador, the situation changes. Many communities are far from hospitals, and travel can take hours due to mountainous terrain, narrow roads, or limited public transportation. In some cases, people also have to rely on small local stores with limited food variety, similar to what was described about reduced access to grocery stores in rural Minnesota. One difference I notice is that in Quito, public transportation is widely used, so not having a car does not automatically mean you cannot access school or services. In contrast, from what was described about rural Minnesota, it seems that having a private vehicle is almost essential.
ReplyDeleteInteresting -- I am happy to learn that public transit is so much more effective and useful in Ecuador. In Northeastern Minnesota, there is (at some times of the year), one bus that runs from the Canadian Border along the shores of Lake Superior to Duluth, once a week!
DeleteHello! I also noticed the similarities between rural Ecuador and rural Minnesota. The difference in terrain is not something I noticed until my sister brought it up. She said she is more cautious the further north she gets because she feels like the roads are narrow and the terrain is hilly. It made me realize how much we do not realize about our living until someone else brings it up. I like how you mentioned public transportation. I wish we had more options for public transportation because it is better for the environment and more affordable. We cannot go anywhere unless we have a personal vehicle or know someone with one. And transportation companies like taxi services are even more expensive once they have to travel outside of town. I think more public transportation would benefit a lot of communities greatly.
DeleteThat's really interesting -- in my experience, public transportation is pretty heavily utilized in more urban areas of Minnesota, but there is definitely a lack of access to such resources in rural areas. In that sense, having a private vehicle is essential if you live in a remote, rural part of Minnesota. Does Ecuador offer public transportation for communities outside of cities? How can Minnesota increase ease of transportation/access to necessary resources?
DeleteMinnesota is a more populous state than the other Midwestern states, such as North Dakota and South Dakota, but it still has plenty of rural areas. I understand ruralness as a spectrum that is delineated by access to vital necessities, like healthcare, education, transportation, and food. This is supported by the report made by the UMN's Center for Transportation Studies. They ran their analysis based on access to grocery stores, high schools, and trauma centers. Ruralness is divided across two categories: rural (urban area adjacent) and rural (isolated). Often, when people think of rural, they think of the urban area adjacent to it, the kinds of farming towns in southeastern Minnesota that, while rural, have reasonable access to cities and other resources. This was the dynamic I spoke about in my last post, but I didn't have the means to describe it as well as I'd wished. I talked about how Duluth is sort of an isolated city, which isn't surrounded by other small towns the way other cities are. If you zoom into southeast rural Minnesota, you will undoubtedly see small, rural towns, but these towns are not isolated, and 10-15 minutes away from another small town, and maybe another 15-30 minutes away from a more substantial small city with more resources. This is a different experience than isolated rurality, which we see in Western and Northern Minnesota. This is an experience where a town, or even just individual households, are substantially far from other towns, and therefore is limited to the resources immediately available to them. Particularly in Northern Minnesota, there is less access to grocery stores, education, and healthcare than in the rural areas in southeast Minnesota, which, although are still more challenged for resources than urban areas, still have a better connection to other towns and cities to get these resources.
ReplyDeleteHockert et al. (2025, January 15). What’s Local in Rural Minnesota? ArcGIS StoryMaps; Esri. https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/30c01bd8c04c41608b813172f83660ba
From my perspective as a student at USFQ, I find your explanation of ruralness as a spectrum very convincing. I also think it is important to understand that “rural” is not just one single type of place but can vary depending on access to services and connections with nearby cities. The distinction made by the UMN's Center for Transportation Studies between rural areas that are adjacent to urban centers and those that are isolated helps explain these differences clearly.
DeleteIn my own experience in Ecuador, I have seen something similar. Some rural communities are close to cities like Quito, so people can reach hospitals, universities, or supermarkets within a short drive. Even though these places are technically rural, residents still have relatively good access to resources. However, there are other rural areas that are much more isolated, especially in mountainous or remote regions, where transportation is limited and basic services such as healthcare or education are harder to access.
Because of this, I agree that rurality should be understood as a gradient rather than a strict rural-urban divide. Access to infrastructure, transportation, and nearby towns plays a huge role in shaping people’s daily lives and opportunities. Your example of the difference between southeastern Minnesota and northern Minnesota illustrates well how distance and connectivity can significantly change the rural experience.
I find the differenciation of both types of rural areas to be very interesting and it also sparks a few questions in my mind. First of all, when I think about the state on MN, I think of a big urban state (and the T-wolves). However, like in every other place there has to be rural areas.
DeleteNow here´s my question: rural (urban area adjacent) areas are near urban areas and connected by roads and highways. Rural (isolated) areas are far from urban areas, but probably connected to the cities by highways as well. In that case, rural (isolated) areas are only considered isolated because of their long distance from urban areas? I ask this because in Ecuador, I believe that rural (isolated) areas are considered isolated not so much because of distance (small country), but also because of how difficult it is to reach these areas (no roads or highways). What are your thoughts?
Jose, this is an essential question. The United States has made a commitment to at least try to serve all its residents equally in access, if not in actuality. So the state highway and interstate freeway system is complex and reaches deep into rural areas.
DeleteIronically, this was largely because a cold-war era government felt like the ability to move military assets around the US quickly. Military bases are often in rural areas, because a military base is an important way to engage economic development in a rural area. But the equipment has to be able to move fast, so we built a complex web of highways.
Now, I think, those highways exist to move goods, not people or weapons.
Honestly, I feel a little out of place talking about this because I think these are things I have not experienced on the same scale as people describe in these comments. In some way, it seems like one of those situations that you need to experience with a city perspective to really understand the kind of problem it is.
ReplyDeleteI would also like to meet these people, learn about their daily routines, and know if they really see this as the problem that it is. I mean, if they see it as a real issue or if they just see it as something normal in their routine, or only as a problem when there is an emergency.
I say this based on my only small experience, where I never saw distance as a problem, but just as something that had to be done. But I think keeping that way of thinking, even if it helps in everyday life, can be bad because you stop seeing the real problem that this distance creates.
I think you are right. But I also worry that some rural people have never known how easy it can be to access some things, in urban areas, and so they do not know how rough they have it. Like someone who only every walks barefoot might never know how great shoes are, you know?
DeleteMy understanding of the urban rural spectrum in Minnesota has expanded through engaging with What’s Local in Rural Minnesota?, which highlights that rural and urban areas are not strictly separate, but deeply interconnected through social, economic, and cultural relationships. Rather than viewing rural Minnesota as isolated or uniform, the source shows that “local” identity varies widely depending on community context, access to resources, and connections to larger regional systems.
ReplyDeleteHockert (2025) emphasizes that rural communities in Minnesota are shaped by how people define and experience “local”, including local businesses, food systems, and community networks. These elements demonstrate that rural areas are not simply defined by low population density, but by strong place based identities and relationships. At the same time, many rural communities are linked to urban centers through commuting, tourism, and economic exchange. This reinforces the idea that rural and urban spaces exist along a continuum rather than as opposites.
The reading also suggests that some rural areas may have characteristics often associated with urban life, such as diverse economies or access to digital technologies, while still maintaining rural cultural identities. Conversely, urban areas can rely heavily on rural regions for resources like food, recreation, and natural spaces. This mutual dependence further blurs the distinction between urban and rural.
Overall, my understanding is that Minnesota’s urban rural spectrum is complex and fluid. Rural communities are diverse, resilient, and connected in multiple ways to broader systems. Recognizing this spectrum is important because it challenges stereotypes and encourages more thoughtful approaches to policy, development, and community engagement that reflect the lived realities of people across different regions of my state!
Man, this interdependence is something I wish I could explain to everyone. Good points.
DeleteAfter reading all the posts about rural Minnesota, what stands out the most to me is that rural and urban are really about access, not just location. Many of you mentioned travel times to schools, grocery stores, and especially hospitals, and honestly that is what defines the experience more than population density. The idea that someone could wait two or even three hours to reach a trauma center is shocking, and it shows how geography directly affects safety and quality of life.
ReplyDeleteFrom my perspective in Ecuador, I see many similarities. Even though the context is different, rural areas here also face challenges with distance, transportation, and limited services. However, something that I find very interesting about Minnesota is how it is mostly rural in land but mostly urban in population, which creates a strong concentration of resources in certain areas like the Twin Cities.
Another key idea I take from this discussion is that rural areas are not all the same. Some are connected and close to cities, while others are isolated, and that difference changes everything. Overall, this discussion helped me understand that rural life is not just about nature or small towns, but about infrastructure, inequality, and access to basic needs, which seems to be a shared challenge across different countries.
I think your verdict about rural Minnesota is super interesting. I guess it doesn't really matter where you are, the main thing that makes you "isolated" is your distance away from the most basic needs. Additionally, when looking at the population density of certain areas, it feels so ingrained to me that cities have all the people and rural areas have almost nobody. It's almost kind of eye-opening to think of how this differs in Ecuador and how many things it must change.
DeleteThis is a great exchange -- thank you both!
DeleteBeing a student from Ecuador, it is very shocking for me, to see how access is very limited in rural areas in the US. This, because there is the idea that in the US, hospitals, grocery stores, schools, etc are way more accesible. I went to Minnesota once and I noticed that rural areas are actually very aside from where all the movement happens. I can't say rural or urban is better than the other, but I can surely say they are very different. I can also connect what you are mentioning to my own experience since I work at hospitals in Ecuador, where kids have travel for hours with their families to get medical attention and then their families have no where to stay while the kids get treated. Specially for the cancer hospitals, where treatments are long, the hospital offers some beds but not enough and not for their whole stay. This is mostly for people coming from communities outside of the city or because of resources. Also, communities also face the challenge of walking a long time to get outside of their houses, community and get to a school and access to education. I enjoyed reading your comments, thank you all so much and I hope to get to know more about Minnesota!
ReplyDeleteThis is really interesting to me. Thank you!
DeleteFor a student from Ecuador, what particularly resonates with me from your description is how rural Minnesota access is not just a geographic issue, but also an economic one. And while you might imagine that the United States is such a resource-rich country, you demonstrate that access to basic services remains mostly dependent on geography and connectivity. On an economic level, the differences between rural and urban areas mirror differences in resource distribution, labor markets, and the existence of institutions. Urban areas also tend to centralize jobs, investment, and services, as a result, solidifying their growth and accessibility. In contrast, rural parts, particularly remote areas, tend to have more expensive and fewer possibilities for development long term. I’ve connected to Ecuador, too, where even rural neighborhoods have structural disadvantages. Healthcare, education and transportation is often not just geographically remote, but also cost-restricted. Still, one distinction remains that in Ecuador, such impediments are much more ingrained, whereas the U.S. has them less visible from the outside. I find it particularly interesting how you differentiate between “adjacent rural” and “isolated rural,” because rural life is not always the same for everyone. This indicates policy solutions should range from those differentiated rather than treating all rural areas as part of the same pie.
ReplyDeleteAndres, this is solid analysis, and I am grateful that the policy angle is so clear to you -- it is what I am working on now!
DeleteFrom my experience living in Ecuador, reading about rural Minnesota helped me understand how strongly access to basic services influences people’s everyday lives, even across very different countries. What stood out to me the most was the long time it can take to reach schools, supermarkets, and especially hospitals, since waiting hours for medical attention in an emergency can be very serious. Even though Ecuador is geographically smaller, I think we face similar challenges. In cities like Quito, it is generally easy to access education, healthcare, and transportation, so daily routines are more efficient. However, outside the city, particularly in rural zones in the Andes Mountains or other remote areas, these services become less accessible, and people often depend on longer travel times, difficult roads, or limited transportation options.
ReplyDeleteAnother point that caught my attention is how essential having a car seems to be in rural Minnesota. In Ecuador, although distance can still be a challenge, public transportation is more widely used, which can make it easier for people without private vehicles to get around. I also agree with the idea that not all rural areas are the same. Some are relatively close to cities and have better access to services, while others are much more isolated and face greater limitations. Overall, this discussion made me realize that being “rural” is not only about location, but also about the level of access people have to opportunities, infrastructure, and essential services, which shapes their quality of life.
Hello Isabella! I agree, in reading the responses on rural Ecuador as well as rural Minnesota, it was definitely interesting to see how similar the struggles are. I think your point about public transportation is especially interesting, as I am someone who grew up in urban Minnesota and am very familiar with public transportation. I had no idea public transportation was also available in more rural communities in Ecuador, as that's relatively unheard of in rural Minnesota. I love the end of your reflection, and totally agree!
DeleteThank you for this cool back and forth!
DeleteMy experience growing up in a rural town is quite unique compared to a lot of other places around the country. I grew up in a town of 15k roughly 40 miles away from the twin cities. A lot of urban cities still have major suburbs with bustling populations and dense economic centers like shopping and finance offices. My hometown Felt like a small town even with its geographical closeness to a high population area. 3 Million live in or around the twin cities suburbs, with the rest of the 2 million overall population dispersed around the state. My hometown was just on the outskirts of this huge cultural and population hub, and it could feel like it was more like 100 miles from the cities. My hometown had infrastructure and restaurants sure, but it felt small and quaint in comparison to cities 20 minutes away and bustling with traffic and commuters. We were one town away from accessing Interstate 94 (The worst road ever, I LOATHE I-94) and I think that had a part to play in why we felt like such a small rural town. Another aspect is the culture in the town itself. We had a lot of farmers in the towns past, and so that lifestyle and by extension many of the cultural, societal, and political views seeped into the towns zeitgeist. Lot of soybeans and cattle come from my hometown, and a lot of people I graduated with stay in that town and plan to die in that town. To summarize, I think where your town in geographically has a huge role to play in the definition of rural. I would also argue that the surrounding culture also helps a town define itself as rural.
ReplyDeleteThis is the zone of so much change, yeah -- forty years ago, your town would have been isolated and very rural.
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